It's not a lack of equipment or crappy genes that cause poor chest development. The real culprits? Poor positioning and poor mind-muscle connection.
Positioning is everything. With the wrong positioning, you'll have no muscle recruitment. Without recruitment, you'll have no adaptive response. Without an adaptive response, muscle growth can't occur.
So when trying the exercises below, pay close attention to your positioning. Learn to make your pecs do the work. Develop that mind-muscle connection and grow a stronger, bigger chest. Bonus: You can do them all without free weights or machines.
This exercise creates an isometric contraction in your pecs. You can pair it with another chest exercise to maximize the effect, creating a compound set (pairing two exercises back-to-back that target the same muscle group). For example, a 10-15 second medball squeeze followed by 15-20 push-ups.
Here's how to do it:
You've probably done the diamond push-up before... and you might have experienced wrist pain. Medball push-ups are similar but they remove some of the stress on your wrists while retaining the benefits.
This variation absolutely destroys your pecs... and you're only doing half the movement!
Now add the concentric portion of the bodyweight chest flye. Do the same exact motion, but from the knees.
This is like the bodyweight equivalent of an incline bench press. The contraction you get in your pec minor (upper chest) is amazing. If you're looking to take it up a notch, add a resistance band.
Tip: When your arms are extended at the top of the push-up, "drag" your hands in towards each other (without actually moving them) and squeeze your pecs for a 2-3 second count.
You can do these one of two ways:
Move both of your arms during the push-up:
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